The present invention relates to the field of user input in handheld portable electronic devices.
As the components required to build a computer system have reduced in size, new categories of computer systems have emerged. One of the more recent categories of computer systems is the portable or xe2x80x9cpalmtopxe2x80x9d computer system, or personal digital assistant (PDA). A palmtop computer system is a computer that is small enough to be held in the hand of a user and is thus xe2x80x9cpalm-sized.xe2x80x9d As a result, palmtops are readily carried about in a briefcase or purse, and some palmtops are compact enough to fit into a person""s pocket. By virtue of their size, palmtop computer systems are also lightweight and so are exceptionally portable and convenient.
Further development of PDAs has enabled their use for more and more tasks. For example, portable, and even wireless, access to computer networks is now readily available with suitably configured devices. The portability and convenience of palmtop devices has enabled the even more exciting possibilities encompassed by the combination of the capabilities of palmtop devices with the communication convenience of wireless phones, e.g. cellular phones.
As the capabilities of the two device types merge, and even combine into the same unit, new demands are made of the small display area available on these characteristically small devices. The display/touch-screen area of these portable devices is necessarily limited by the size of the devices themselves, which is their primary advantage. In particular, the use of a palmtop computing device that is also a cellular phone has been limited by the requirement of having a telephone keypad implemented on the body of the device, further squeezing the already small available display area.
One possible solution seen in pen-based phones, those implemented with the functions and operating system of a PDA, is the incorporation of the telephone dialing display into the operating system graphical user interface (GUI). This implementation necessitates that the user look at the touch-screen in order to properly dial a number. Similarly, palmtop devices implemented as wireless telephones either must incorporate a hard keypad into the palmtop body, enlarging the device; implement the keypad in the dialing display, which invokes the aforementioned limitation of requiring the user to look at the display while dialing; or supply a separate keypad device and connecting cable, entailing use of what becomes a much less portable and handy device.
What is required, therefore, is a mechanism by which the palmtop device and/or wireless telephone can eliminate the large pushbutton keypad. Such a mechanism must allow for a relatively larger display area, on the order of those now enjoyed in palmtop devices, and still allow full functionality of a keypad.
Presented herein is a mechanism for providing a tactile keypad that incorporates the functions of a pushbutton keypad into the touch-screen display of a portable electronic device. The tactile pushbutton keypad may be removable. The mechanism presented herein allows for a relatively larger display area on small devices while still allowing full functionality of both the touch-screen display and the pushbutton keypad.
Embodiments of the present invention relate to methods of enabling a portable electronic device with a transparent, flexible, removable, pushbutton overlay that lays over at least a portion of the graphic touch-screen display on the portable electronic device. The pushbuttons in the overlay are designed to transmit finger pressure to the pressure-sensitive touch-screen display and also to provide a natural feeling tactile feedback to the user. At the same time, being transparent, the overlay allows the user to view the contents of the Graphical User Interface that are presented directly beneath the buttons and allow the user to respond to those contents. The buttons are, in some embodiments, enabled as magnifying lenses in order to better present the GUI contents.
More specifically, embodiments of the present invention include a portable electronic device; comprising a computing circuit, power supply, housing, graphic touch-screen display, and a transparent, flexible, overlay that covers at least a portion of the graphic touch-screen display; and the graphic touch-screen display is capable of receiving finger pressure through the transparent, flexible, overlay.